Red-hot Tigers pounce for four in first, beat Solehi 5-3

Tigers win fifth straight, putting themselves in Colonial contention.

Pitchers can set the tone for an entire softball team, not only with their ability, but also with how they get along with others.

Northwestern Lehigh's softball team has won five consecutive games, and while the team has been hitting well, its two pitchers have been instrumental to the streak with their unity in the circle.

Freshman Emily Bennett and junior Ashley Eden combined to hold visiting Southern Lehigh to three runs, and the Tigers were able to make four first-inning runs stick Monday for a 5-3 Colonial League win that makes Northwestern a team to watch in the second half of the season.

The Tigers hit the midway mark at 7-3 overall and have won five straight after a 2-3 start. They are 5-2 in the league and a definite Colonial playoff contender.

"The difference has been getting more comfortable with each other and playing together more as a team," Eden said. "I like to pitch a lot, but we have two good pitchers on this team and we are a team, so that's how it has to be."

Bennett worked the first five innings, but left after Southern Lehigh collected three hits and scored twice in the fifth.

"I don't mind sharing the pitching with Ashley," Bennett said. "She's a great pitcher and three games a week can be tough on an arm. Southern Lehigh has good hitters and I wasn't getting the umpire's calls I wanted. It was time for a change and Ashley came in and did great."

Eden took the ball for the sixth, trying to protect a 4-3 lead, and immediately found herself in trouble as two errors put runners on second and third with one out.

Northwestern stayed calm and Eden got Alyssa Herr on a line-out to first and Danielle Mullin on a fly-out to center.

Southern Lehigh had its 3-4-5 hitters up in the seventh, but Eden got them in order to give the Tigers a win that kept them as hot as the unusual mid-April weather.

"Our hitting has been a strength and we're riding every game with Ashley and Emily," Northwestern coach Jen Horner said. "They're doing a nice job. When one gets in trouble, the other comes in and does the job. They know their role and they have been very supportive of one another.

"Neither is overpowering, and when the other team has its lineup coming through for the third or fourth time, we need to give them a different look and that's when we make the change. Plus, coach [Josh] Zimmerman does a great job calling the pitches."

Horner, however, isn't ready to call her team a contender, even though it entered play on Monday tied for second in the CL North with Palmerton and owning one of the five best records in the league.

"We're showing more confidence as a team and jelling well right now," Horner said. "But we're just going game by game because anybody can beat anybody this year. It's hard to predict. This is not a predictable league at all.

"We can't get ahead of ourselves. We still have areas to improve upon. We didn't play a perfect game today. We gave up a lot of outs in one inning. But it's going to happen."

It has happened all too often for veteran Southern Lehigh coach Brian Neefe, whose defending league champs hit the midway mark of the season at a disappointing 3-7 overall, 3-4 in the league.

All five of Northwestern's runs were unearned.

"What's disheartening to me is that we don't seem to be getting any better," Neefe said. "We had a chance today, but we were 0-for-15 from the fifth spot on down in the batting order. We had a lot of hits from the first four hitters, but we couldn't get anything from the other spots.

"It's not that we're 3-7 that bothers me; it's that we are not getting any better. We're putting the time in, but there's no improvement. We've had teams before that were not overly skilled, but we've always had teams who competed. This one hasn't to this point. They're good kids. And they do work hard. I just don't know what it is. If I did, I'd fix it."